Viacom Files Copyright Infringement Lawsuit Against YouTube andGoogle Over Unauthorized Use Of The Company's Shows
Viacom International, Inc. v. YouTube, Inc., YouTube, LLC,and Google, Inc.
March 13, 2007
Viacom and its companies file a copyright infringement lawsuit against YouTube and Google seeking at least $1 billion in damages.
The media company charges that “YouTube has harnessed technology to willfully infringe copyrights on a huge scale,” by taking “the value of creative content on a massive scale for YouTube’s benefit without payment or license. The suit alleges that the copyright infringement is on such a large scale that it “identified more than 150,000 unauthorized clips of their copyrighted programming on YouTube that had been viewed an astounding 1.5 billion times.”
The suit also charges that YouTube selectively deploys filtering technology "[b]y limiting copyright protectiong to business partners who have agreed to grant it licenses," even though copyright holders are entitled to protection of their works under federal copyright law without such business agreements.
Viacom gets sued for blocking parody on YouTube
Activist groups are suing Viacom for improperly asking the video-sharing site YouTube to remove a parody of the network’s The Colbert Report. The parody in question, “Stop the falsiness” is a play on the host Stephen Colbert’s use of the term “truthiness” and was produced by MoveOn and Brave New Films – an activist production company that has made documentaries on the Iraq war, Wal-Mart, and the Fox News Channel. They argue that although the video contains clips taken from the television show, it was protected under the “fair use” provisions of copyright law.
They also claim that Viacom should have known that the use was legal and thus its complaint to YouTube to have the video blocked amounted to “misrepresentation” and therefore subject to damages under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act 1998 (DMCA).
Under the DMCA, YouTube and other service providers are generally immune from copyright lawsuits as long as they promptly respond to copyright complaints, known as takedown notices. A takedown notice was sent to YouTube last week, and the video was blocked almost immediately.
Service providers are not required to investigate claims under the DMCA and in fact could lose their immunity if they take too long to respond. The law does give users the right to sue the issuer of the takedown request when it contains misrepresentations that an item is infringing.
This suit comes a week after Viacom filed a $1 billion lawsuit against YouTube.
DMCA Architect Acknowledges Need For A New Approach
After looking at the above 2 articles it seems fitting to add this entry I found on Michael Guest’s blog site. Dr. Michael Geist is the Canada Research Chair of Internet and E-commerce Law at the University of Ottawa. The following is what he had to say about a conference hosted at the McGill University, featuring Bruce Lehman, the architect of the WIPO Internet Treaties and the DMCA as one of the speakers.
The most interesting - and surprising - presentation came from Bruce Lehman, who now heads the International Intellectual Property Institute. Lehman explained the U.S. perspective in the early 1990s that led to the DMCA (ie. greater control though TPMs), yet when reflecting on the success of the DMCA acknowledged that "our Clinton administration policies didn't work out very well" and "our attempts at copyright control have not been successful" (presentation starts around 11:00).
Moreover, Lehman says that we are entering the "post-copyright" era for music, suggesting that a new form of patronage will emerge with support coming from industries that require music (webcasters, satellite radio) and government funding. While he says that teens have lost respect for copyright, he lays much of the blame at the feet of the recording industry for their failure to adapt to the online marketplace in the mid-1990s.In a later afternoon discussion, Lehman went further, urging Canada to think outside the box on future copyright reform. While emphasizing the need to adhere to international copyright law (ie. Berne), he suggested that Canada was well placed to experiment with new approaches. He was not impressed with Bill C-60, seemingly because he does not believe that it went far enough in reshaping digital copyright issues. Given ongoing pressure from the U.S., I'm skeptical about Canada's ability to chart a new course on copyright, yet if the architect of the DMCA is willing to admit that change is needed, then surely our elected officials should take notice.
Viacom International, Inc. v. YouTube, Inc., YouTube, LLC,and Google, Inc.
March 13, 2007
Viacom and its companies file a copyright infringement lawsuit against YouTube and Google seeking at least $1 billion in damages.
The media company charges that “YouTube has harnessed technology to willfully infringe copyrights on a huge scale,” by taking “the value of creative content on a massive scale for YouTube’s benefit without payment or license. The suit alleges that the copyright infringement is on such a large scale that it “identified more than 150,000 unauthorized clips of their copyrighted programming on YouTube that had been viewed an astounding 1.5 billion times.”
The suit also charges that YouTube selectively deploys filtering technology "[b]y limiting copyright protectiong to business partners who have agreed to grant it licenses," even though copyright holders are entitled to protection of their works under federal copyright law without such business agreements.
Viacom gets sued for blocking parody on YouTube
Activist groups are suing Viacom for improperly asking the video-sharing site YouTube to remove a parody of the network’s The Colbert Report. The parody in question, “Stop the falsiness” is a play on the host Stephen Colbert’s use of the term “truthiness” and was produced by MoveOn and Brave New Films – an activist production company that has made documentaries on the Iraq war, Wal-Mart, and the Fox News Channel. They argue that although the video contains clips taken from the television show, it was protected under the “fair use” provisions of copyright law.
They also claim that Viacom should have known that the use was legal and thus its complaint to YouTube to have the video blocked amounted to “misrepresentation” and therefore subject to damages under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act 1998 (DMCA).
Under the DMCA, YouTube and other service providers are generally immune from copyright lawsuits as long as they promptly respond to copyright complaints, known as takedown notices. A takedown notice was sent to YouTube last week, and the video was blocked almost immediately.
Service providers are not required to investigate claims under the DMCA and in fact could lose their immunity if they take too long to respond. The law does give users the right to sue the issuer of the takedown request when it contains misrepresentations that an item is infringing.
This suit comes a week after Viacom filed a $1 billion lawsuit against YouTube.
DMCA Architect Acknowledges Need For A New Approach
After looking at the above 2 articles it seems fitting to add this entry I found on Michael Guest’s blog site. Dr. Michael Geist is the Canada Research Chair of Internet and E-commerce Law at the University of Ottawa. The following is what he had to say about a conference hosted at the McGill University, featuring Bruce Lehman, the architect of the WIPO Internet Treaties and the DMCA as one of the speakers.
The most interesting - and surprising - presentation came from Bruce Lehman, who now heads the International Intellectual Property Institute. Lehman explained the U.S. perspective in the early 1990s that led to the DMCA (ie. greater control though TPMs), yet when reflecting on the success of the DMCA acknowledged that "our Clinton administration policies didn't work out very well" and "our attempts at copyright control have not been successful" (presentation starts around 11:00).
Moreover, Lehman says that we are entering the "post-copyright" era for music, suggesting that a new form of patronage will emerge with support coming from industries that require music (webcasters, satellite radio) and government funding. While he says that teens have lost respect for copyright, he lays much of the blame at the feet of the recording industry for their failure to adapt to the online marketplace in the mid-1990s.In a later afternoon discussion, Lehman went further, urging Canada to think outside the box on future copyright reform. While emphasizing the need to adhere to international copyright law (ie. Berne), he suggested that Canada was well placed to experiment with new approaches. He was not impressed with Bill C-60, seemingly because he does not believe that it went far enough in reshaping digital copyright issues. Given ongoing pressure from the U.S., I'm skeptical about Canada's ability to chart a new course on copyright, yet if the architect of the DMCA is willing to admit that change is needed, then surely our elected officials should take notice.
posted by Clem | 11:38 AM
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